Ariello and 23 other students in his age group are participants in the WaterBotics summer camp, a program that challenges students to design, build, program and test underwater robots.

The camp is designed to give students a task to accomplish each day, which get progressively harder over the five-day period.

"Missions are meant to capture students' imaginations," said Arthur Camins, director of the Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education at Stevens.

The participants need to work in teams to build a LEGOs robot and program it to glide on the surface of the water, turn in a figure-eight, move up and down in water and move objects underwater, he added.

Each "mission" has a practical application, Camins said.

The robots need to grab a ping pong ball from one side of a blow up pool and bring it to the other, simulating the rescue of a drowning swimmer.

One of the staff members and a Stevens biomedical engineering major, Mark Liotta, has been working with campers to help them build their robots.

"They learn some of these concepts in science class, like buoyancy, and get to apply them in real-life scenarios," the Chatham native said.

Liotta also said that he was impressed with the kids' programming skills.

Despite their young age, many of the campers said they had some experience with building, programming or coding before WaterBotics.

"We challenge (the kids with experience) with some high level programming," said Deputy Director Mercedes McKay.

However, she emphasized the program is built assuming the participants have no experience; the WaterBotics team also organizes participants based on skill level.

The varying skill set of the students is one of the distinguishing markers of WaterBotics summer camp.

"The program is meant to be inclusive," Camins said. "We specifically designed the program to be appealing to multiple audiences."

WaterBotics is also one of the few programs that has reported over 50 percent of its participants are girls, he added.

Aubrey Beam, 14, was one of five girls participating in the Hoboken program this week.

"I'm interested in science and I plan to become a chemical oceanographer," she said, her eyes trained on tweaking the robot's propeller. "I thought this would be good experience."

The program centers on real world applications, explained Danielle Woodruffe, public relations director at Stevens.

"Through our work with the National Girls Collaborative Project, we've come to recognize that not all children learn through competition and some actually check out when put into that kind of situation," she wrote in an email to The Jersey Journal.

"However, when challenges are presented as real life scenarios, we realize we can have success with every student and win over a more diverse crowd of next generation engineers – which is currently what the national STEM workforce is lacking," Woodruffe wrote.

Using this model, the program has garnered over 2,400 participants nationally and is growing in popularity.

In previous years, the five-day camp had two session options. This year, WaterBotics added an additional third week just for Hoboken residents.

Typically, the program costs $500 per student that covered the cost of materials and staff. With a grant from the PSEG Foundation, the cost dropped to $250 this year, and Hoboken residents were able to register for free, McKay said.

"If you want kids to want to be involved in science, math, engineering and technology, the way to do it is to create these very creative programs," PSEG Foundation President Ellen Lambert said.

The foundation donated $18,000 to $20,000 for the program, Lambert said.

"It's not always about how much you give, but the value based on the program," she said, adding how rewarding it was to see the camp's growing success in Hoboken.

Both Lambert and Camins spoke about the growing need for diversity in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) workforce and how the program attempts to develop kids' interest early.

"We hope it will be one of the go-to programs to engage kids to learn about engineering design in the context of science," Camins said.

On the first day of camp, Hoboken resident Brandon Lui said he had no experience with building and programming robots.